"I tell you, you do hurt me—you pull as hard as anything," cried Bunny growing very red.
"Very well, miss, if you are in such humour," cried Sophie, "you may just stand there till you get back to your temper again. I'm going into the next room to get your frock, and I hope that when I come back you will be quiet and let me dress your hair like a little lady," and the maid flounced out of the nursery, leaving Bunny standing before the glass in her short white petticoat, with one shoe off and the other on, her hair hanging in disorder about her shoulders, and her face puckered up in dismay at Sophie's sudden and unexpected departure.
"Oh, why was I so cross about my hair?" she cried. "Papa and Mervyn will be here directly, and just look at the state I am in. What shall I do? What shall I do? Sophie, I'll be good. Do come back, and get me ready to go down."
But Sophie did not answer, nor did she return, and poor Bunny sat down on the edge of her crib, and in spite of all the efforts she made to keep them back, the big tears rolled slowly down her cheeks.
Suddenly the sound of wheels was heard upon the gravel below, and brushing away her tears, the little girl started to her feet and ran over to the window.
A cab covered with luggage was coming in at the big gate, and in a minute she saw her papa nodding gaily up to his little Bunny, with a bright well-pleased smile upon his dear face.
Without a moment's thought as to the state she was in, or of what her papa or the little boy from India might think of her in such a condition, Bunny dropped the blind, and with a joyful cry of "Papa, papa, my own dear papa," she rushed out of the nursery and away down the stairs.
"My little darling! My sweet little Bun," exclaimed Mr. Dashwood, as the small wild-looking figure came running along the hall and jumped into his arms. "Why, dear, why did you come out of the nursery before you were dressed?" he said, as he smoothed back the ruffled hair and kissed the hot cheeks of the excited child. "You are in a strange state to receive visitors, Bunny dear, and I am afraid cousin Mervyn will be shocked at my wild girl, for he is a very tidy little man, I can tell you. Mervyn, this is your cousin Ethel, commonly called Bunny, I hope you will be very good friends," and he put out his hand to a pale gentle-looking boy of about seven years old, who was clinging shyly to the skirts of an Indian Ayah, as though afraid to let her go from beside him for an instant.
When Bunny raised her head from her papa's shoulder to look at her new cousin, her eyes suddenly lighted upon the grinning black face of the strange foreign-looking woman, and with one wild yell of terror she turned away, and buried her little face in her father's coat.
"Oh, send that dreadful thing away!" she cried, "I'm not half so naughty as I used to be! And I have promised Miss Kerr to be so good! Oh, papa, papa, don't give your little Bunny to that dreadful black woman."